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Post by Val the Cookie Queen
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New Year´s Salutations APJ.
I saw the New Year in wearing Bandit EdP and Extrait together. An old fragrance but new to me. I received a large decant of the EdP as a gift and went straight out and bought the Extrait. Sometimes you just know. I have made two perfume related resolutions for the new year. Not to walk around with my nose glued to my wrist, as it totally distorts my impressions, being the first. The scent sticks in my nose cavity and that is useless. Second, I am not going to investigate note lists before trying anything new, which will mean walking round the Esxence in Milan with a blindfold on I expect. Just looking at a list stops me from trying so much. Not that I expect to like any more than I usually do, but you never know!
Scent Eating Skin: Fact or Fiction
Each time I come across the phrase “on my scent eating skin” I roll my eyes loudly. I have done absolutely no research on this subject matter, presuming it to be a myth; but a more serious interest wast triggered by a panic phone call from a dear perfumista (S) friend about a month ago. She had ordered and received a bottle of perfume that she had loved on me. Not exactly a blind by as she had spent the best part of a day continually sniffing my hand. As we perfume geeks do.
“Val, I generously sprayed this perfume on and in less than ten minutes it is GONE.” Dead. Deceased. Departed. Finished. Spent. Exhausted. It is no more. Bringing to mind Monty Python´s Dead Parrot Sketch. I quietly rolled my eyes, a little unsure at this point. “Perhaps there has been mistake at the production end?” she asked me. I doubted it but stranger things have happened.
Weird. I hopped on a train to Vienna to smell this thing for myself. It is always better to have a witness in a serious situation so we called in the help of another perfumista (M). The three of us sat comfortably around a table, ordered breakfast and cracked out the bottle in question. With intently serious faces, for this was a scientific analysis, S and I heftily spritzed. M remained on the sideline as an impartial judge.
Before breakfast arrived the perfume (an EdP by the way) on S had disintegrated. Disappeared. Time elapsed was probably around ten minutes. I got about 12 hours out of it. WTF? M was equally stunned. S told us that this was not the only fragrance that disappeared on her. I must admit over the years I have been gobsmacked at the amount of fragrance that S sprays not to even mention the fact that she FINISHES bottles, something I have never done. I should add here that I also generously dabbed S in a favorite extrait of mine (guess) and within 45 minutes it was also history. Perturbed.
I don´t think I own a perfume that gives me less than 12 hours of pleasure minimum. It has truly got me wondering. Are skins really that different? Is that why S smells a million dollars in Amouage and I do not?
There is a happy ending to the story. I received the aforemetioned ordered bottle for Christmas. 
Dear readers of APJ, perhaps you could be kind enough to take time for a quick comment? Do you have an opinion on the scent eating skin theory. Do some skins just outright reject fragrances? Are S and I at opposite ends of the spectrum, both being extreme? It is no wonder that I am scared spitless of spraying something unknown onto my skin if I have to live with it for the next fortnight.
Wishing you all strength for 2016.
Keep on truckin’.
Bussis
CQ